by Rick Church, Head Coach, CM Services, Inc. The Association Management Company

Good Leaders Understand the Value of the Team

I recently read an article published in the New York Times about how IBM develops new ideas through a collaborative team effort. You can read it here.

A critical value most successful teams have is TRUST. When members of a team trust each other, they can accomplish great things together.

Unfortunately, trust doesn’t always exist on teams.

IBM has developed this interesting collaborative structure for teams that seems to work for them when trust doesn’t exist. (Be mindful that in this case there isn’t mistrust. It’s just that their team is either too new, too large or to disparate to have developed trust in each other).

Their collaborative process seems interesting to me. We may try it the next time we need to find a solution to a challenge in our business.

About Rick

Rick Church is Head Coach of CM Services, Inc. The Association Partnership Company. CM Services pioneered the concept of developing long-term partnerships with national and international trade associations and professional medical associations. Mr. Church has published articles and given presentations about association leaders (both volunteer and paid). Mr. Church served as president of the Association Management Company Institute (AMCi). While on AMCi's Board of Directors, Mr. Church was very involved in the development of the AMCi/ANSI standard for Association Management Companies and the AMCi certification program based on that standard.